NHS tells cancer patient her care will stop if she buys extra drugs

A cancer patient yesterday condemned health chiefs as immoral for threatening to stop her free NHS care if she buys a drug to help her treatment.

Former nurse Colette Mills was told her health authority would not provide the "wonder drug" Avastin.

It also rejected her offer to pay the £4,000 a month bill for it herself.

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But the 58-year-old, who is having chemotherapy after breast cancer spread through her body, was shocked to discover if she bought the drug privately then she would be liable to pay the entire bill for all of her care - likely to reach £15,000 a month.

Mrs Mills and her husband Eric were forced to back down because they could not afford this.

Ministers justify the policy by arguing that a two-tier NHS would be created, with those who could afford additional treatment paying for it while others in equal need having to cope without.

But Mrs Mills, a mother-of-two, has criticised the policymakers for having double standards.

She said when she needed a scan, health chiefs were happy for her to go private to avoid a lengthy wait as this was considered a "top up".

Yet when she asked to buy an extra drug this was rejected on the basis it was an "add on".

"I know there are funding issues within the NHS, but what the policymakers have done is unfair, unjust and immoral," she said.

"The whole concept of the NHS is that it's free at the point of need. Why should that stop because I want to pay for something?

"The policy of my local NHS trust is that I must be an NHS patient or a private patient."

Mrs Mills' hospital specialist believes treating her with Avastin in conjunction with the chemotherapy drug Taxol, which she is being provided with, would give her the best chance of prolonging her life.

Mrs Mills said research indicated it had been successful with breast cancer patients.

"It would probably give me a longer life and a better quality of life," she said.

Avastin is licensed for use in the UK, but not generally available on the NHS as the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence has yet to make a ruling on its use.

Mrs Mills and her husband, an advertising agency boss, believe they are also victims of a postcode lottery.

Mr Mills of Hutton Rudby, North Yorkshire, said: "We understand there are other trusts that do provide Avastin.

"Because our PCT is one of the most heavily overspent in the whole of the country and they refuse to pay."

Mrs Mills has been battling breast cancer on and off for three decades and has had a mastectomy.

The cancer returned four years ago and has spread through her body to her hips, spine and liver.

She has been receiving treatment at the Friarage Hospital in Northallerton and is due to have a scan on Tuesday to see how effective her latest chemotherapy treatment has been.

South Tees Hospitals NHS Trust said: "If a patient chooses to go private for certain drugs they elect to become a private patient for the course of their treatment for that condition. That is the trust policy."